Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween to all my wonderful blogger friends! Have a safe night! We will be taking the girls and my niece and nephew trick-or-treating. I will be sure to post pictures later! Not sure yet what Meghan will be....either Tigger, a ladybug, or Mickey Mouse. Destiny is going to be Tinkerbell...or "Binkabell" as she says. :)


Happy Halloween Comments for Myspace

Breaking Point

Do y'all remember back in August when I said I had literally lost my best friend? I'd had a post in draft that I'd started working on, but never finished it or posted it, obviously. It was just one of those things I didn't want to get into too much on here, so I've been quietly dealing with it on my own. Well, no more! What follows is what I wrote to her in a handwritten letter, with thoughts of mailing it to her parents' house, where I know she'd eventually get it. I haven't mailed it yet...it seems I have more stuff to say due to new happenings. Your thoughts and opinions are welcome. Oh yeah, I'm going to include her actual first name. (but not her last because I'm not stupid...I don't wish any harm to her!) I just don't care anymore. Well, that might not be entirely true, but this way if she ever googles herself she'll find this post even if I don't end up mailing this letter to her. Also, the particular incident I refer to in the letter occured just the weekend before I ended up in the hospital with appendicitis. Which by the way, she didn't know about...or MrKB's Mom having her brain tumors...that happened the weekend AFTER my surgery. Shitty few weekends there, lemme tell ya! I'm going to type the letter in red, because it represents how I've felt all this time. I will put additional comments to help explain to y'all various parts in my normal purple color.

Dear Matoaka, October 20, 2006

I'm writing this letter because I've had a lot of things on my mind, and I never seem to have the chance to sit down and talk to you about them. Kinda hard to do anyway since I've only seen you the one time in the past two months. (After she really screwed up royally, we didn't see or hear from her for that long.)

First of all, let me say a few things about what happened that last weekend that you and Nick were here. Now, while we can't prove whether it was you OR Nick who took ALL THE CASH WE HAD LEFT, but we do know that y'all pretty much went straight from here to the dope dealer's house. Also, you told us, "We're going to my Daddy's to see my boys and get some money, then we'll bring back something to eat." Yeah...you never went to your Dad's...he wasn't even expecting you at all! We went by there when we were looking for y'all after discovering the money gone. (We found the money missing only about 30 mins. after they left.) It was over $150.00 by the way!! Your Dad said that you hadn't even called or anything, and that he hadn't seen or heard from you in a few days!

ANYWAY...finally we got ahold of you on the phone...first when we confronted you about the money, you tried to say that "Well, maybe you dropped it somewhere." There was just no possibility of that, since the money was in his (MrKB's) jeans pocket, which were lying beside our bed on the floor where he'd taken them off at. The money was there when he reached in the pocket to get his lighter, and neither one of us touched them again until we went to get money for the pizza guy after y'all left. If it had been "dropped" it would've been right there by our bed. Of course, when we told you this, you were busted! You then said, "I'll call you back." You didn't until a day or two later, and THEN you were full of apologies for this happening and said that you'd try to bring us some money the next day...after that, we didn't see or hear from you again until this last weekend!
(Yeah, and then she says she'd been too embarrassed to call us, and that her boyfriend Nick was "Out of her life...completely out of her life." More on THAT in a bit.)

I've gotta tell you, that I don't trust anyone anymore because of what happened, NOBODY except for my husband and my family. My trust in people was already paper-thin, and then...damn. I've never been so hurt and angry in my entire life!!

Matoaka, you and my husband have been friends for over 20 YEARS...you and I have been best friends for almost 10 years. The way you've acted towards us has made us both feel like our friendship doesn't mean that much to you at all. I guess if we can't do anything for you...namely, get you high...then you don't have any use for us.

Our friendship can MAYBE still be saved, but coming over after being gone for two months, then taking off with some other "friend" is not the way to do it. AGAIN you said you were coming back, and you didn't. I KNEW you weren't going to be back over as soon as he (MrKB) told me that you took all of your stuff with you! That's how it's always been, and I'm tired of it!! If you don't want to come back over, fine, then don't!! Just SAY so. Don't make us get worried that something awful happened to you. Quit making me feel so hurt!

Then, he talked to you on Tuesday. He told me that you PROMISED you'd call back in a bit. Surprise, surprise...Wednesday and Thursday have come and gone, and nothing. (She actually didn't call again until the 27th, a week after I wrote this letter.)

Matoaka, despite everything that's happened, I love you and I want things to be right between us again, but you have to want it too, and right now it doesn't seem like you do. Like I said, showing up at our place for a few hours and taking off somewhere else is not the way to fix it.

It's up to you now. Please, no more lies, and no more bullshit. If we mean anything to you, and you TRULY want to be a part of our lives again, you've got to show some real effort and sincerity. (When she'd finally called after two months, she left messages on our machine begging and crying for us to let her back in our lives.) I can't take being hurt anymore, Matoaka...I just can't. If DECADES of friendship really means anything to you, prove it!! Be a true friend.
~Dana~

(Added October 30th) Well, you've done it again. This time we get a call Friday afternoon from you saying that you and your youngest would like to come over and stay the night, spend some time with us and our girls. We had someplace to go for a couple hours that evening, but told you we'd come by and pick you up after. We get to your parents' house to pick y'all up, and you come out and tell us that you're going to go to some haunted house thing, and is it alright if you come over after? We say, "Fine, ok." You again PROMISED (you even said "Scout's honor"!) and I asked you at least twice if you were definitely coming over, and you said yes, that you'd be there in about an hour and a half. I was still doubtful that you would, but hopeful that maybe this time you would keep your word, and not just blowing smoke up my ass.

By the way, while my husband stood on the porch and talked to you while I waited in the van with the girls, who comes walking by from around the side of the house?? Fucking Nick!! The same one who you claimed was "Out of your life, COMPLETELY out of your life." More lies, apparently. I guess you just love having a guy around that is SUCH good people, with the beating on you and shit. Or is that even more lies? I can't believe anything you say anymore.

So we went back home and waited. I figured you probably wouldn't actually be here in an hour and a half like you said you would, but that was okay. Then it got to be like 1:30a.m. Yeah...I could be pretty much 100% positive that you weren't coming at that point. Of course, true to form, you didn't at least pick up a damn phone and call to say "Change of plans" or SOMETHING. Oh, no...apparently we're not worth the effort of a fucking phone call. Not even a call today! No "I'm sorry I didn't make it, and I would've called but it was very late" or anything.

Do you know how hard I cried last night??? How my heart just felt like it was breaking to a million pieces because my supposed best friend doesn't seem to care at all about anybody but herself?? That she's essentially throwing away the friendship of two people who have cared about her, helped her through rough times, been there for her, and watched her boys grow up?? And for what?! I'm willing to bet real money that it was so you could hang with your "friends" that can get you high. If you're making ME feel this badly, I shudder at the thought of how your two children must feel!

SO...ya know what? FUCK YOU!! I am DONE. I'm NOT doing this anymore. Get your life together and your freaking priorities straight. I'm not helping you anymore. Since you can't be there for me...I'm no longer gonna be here for you. Have a nice life.

Hiya! :)

Bet y'all have been wondering where I've been, huh? Well, I've been computerless for the last week! Either the battery (I didn't even know computers HAD batteries!) or my motherboard decided to bite the dust...not sure exactly which one yet. Good thing I have my Daddy to fix my 'puter for me when it acts up, otherwise I'm sure I'd be getting ripped off by some shop somewhere! I actually have a different computer now, but it's got my hard drive in it...thankfully it wasn't the hard drive that crashed...I've got tons of pictures of the girls on it from the last year and a half. I haven't had a CD burner so I could put them on disk, but now I do since this computer has one! Yippee!!! Yeah, now I have the daunting task of organizing all the pics and burning them to disk. That should keep me busy for quite awhile!

Anyway....Thank you so much for all the nice comments on the new pictures! :) I knew y'all would like them! And yes, I was absolutely THRILLED to be able to get them done with all four of the girls! My stepdaughters have taken to visiting in the summer one at a time instead of both of them, since they're at the age where they can't stand each other for long. They weren't too bad while they were both here for a week, they bickered quite a bit, but it just reminded me of my sister and me at that age. I couldn't stand my sister then either, and she couldn't stand me. Ah, memories! LOL

Can you believe how tall my youngest stepdaughter is?!? She towers over her sister already, and she's definitely going to be taller than me if she keeps growing. We're both 5'7" now! She's taller than her Mom too....must get her height from MrKB....he's just a quarter-inch shy of being 6'.

The oldest one...I told y'all she's gorgeous! She knows it too, which worries her Daddy to death, especially now that she has a 17 yr old boyfriend! I worry too, but I know that we've got to trust her to make good decisions. When we were in Texas, MrKB caught them making out in her bedroom, and he was NOT happy! (The door was open.) I told him to think back to when we were their age...we did it too! And making out is not the same as actually having sex. He's like, "Yeah, but I'm a guy and I know what guys that age are after!" I said, "Yeah, well, don't mean they'll get it...they didn't from me, and believe me they tried!" (At least they didn't get it when I was 15 yrs old!!) It all comes back to the fact that we're gonna have to trust her.

My Mom-in-law is doing good. She got the staples out the other day (33 by the way!) and stopped by yesterday. She said she felt really good, and I'm glad. Part of her not feeling well was the fact that she's had problems sleeping. She got her first good night's sleep the night before and could really tell the difference in how she felt. She has had a few problems since the surgery, though. Apparently she's lost control of her legs a few times, and has fallen. They give out on her, or she just can't move them. We think that maybe the other large tumor might be being more active now that the one in the front is gone. We just have to hope it doesn't start causing major problems before her next surgery. Doctors are already talking about doing the surgery sometime in November, instead of December, since she's been recovering so well. I know that we will all be glad when the tumors are all gone, but nobody will be as glad as Mom!

Got a call last night from an "adoption transition caseworker", or something like that...she's going to come out for a visit Friday afternoon. Progress is going slowly, but at least it's happening! We've had some visits from different workers that have to do with the adoption already, and we've had our home assessment done. That went good, wasn't much to do since we'd been assessed before to be foster parents to them in the first place. We still need to get our physicals done. We haven't yet since this time we have to pay for it out of our pockets, and we just haven't had a chance to get to the doctor's office. I need to call the doctor anyway, since Meghan needs to have shots. I dread shot time, so have been procrastinating on that too.

That's about all the news I can think of for now! Hope y'all are doing good. Thanks again for the nice comments on the pictures...y'all made me smile! :)

PICTURES!!!

I know y'all have been waiting (impatiently!) for these pics, so....here ya go! By the way, I've never posted pics of my stepdaughters before. The tall one is actually my youngest stepdaughter...she'll be 14 next month. Shorter one is my oldest stepdaughter...she is 15 going on 25! :)

It's My Blogiversary!!!

So here I am, one year later! Happy Blogiversary to me! When I started this blog, Meghan was 6 months old. (In the pic above, she's not quite 6 months, but close enough!) I thought having a blog would be a really good way to keep track of her milestones, 'cuz we know that we Moms don't go running for the baby book each and every time, do we?? I have a record on here of firsts I wanted to remember for her baby book, complete with pictures. :) I also started writing this blog to have sort of a record of our adventures in foster parenting and DHS battles. We've had some drama, haven't we? Thanks to all my loyal readers who've been following the whole saga...I know I'm probably really boring at times, but you still come around to visit! :)

Today Meghan is 18 months old, and I can't believe how much she's grown and changed! Time really does fly. She's into everything now, and is starting to get more and more independent every day. She makes me laugh all the time with the funny stuff she does, and it's such a delight to see her discover new things that she can do. :)

As for me, I hang in there...staying sane! (With a little help from Jose every now and then!) A couple days ago I was playing around with my nephew, and ended up kicking our metal chair and damn near breaking my pinky toe! Had to take some pics to commemorate the occasion...




















Looks painful, huh? Trust me, it is! It's been two days since I did it and it's still bruised real good and I can't wear my shoes except for flip-flops or my slippers. Then last night we went out to dinner and when Destiny was jumping out of the van, guess where she landed?? Yup, right on my sore foot!!! I clenched my hand around hers real tight when she did it, and I let go of her and told her she better go to her big sister...I was afraid I'd lash out and hurt her! Thankfully she didn't land on the most painful spot, or I wouldn't have still been standing. It made me cry for a few minutes, then we went in to eat and I ordered a great big ol' strawberry margarita to ease the pain! Hehehe...

Waiting for MrKB to get home from work now so we can go and get those pictures done. My stepdaughters go back home to Texas tomorrow, and I'm really going
to miss them! They've been a big help with their little sisters. Every morning this week I've been able to sleep in, and when I got up the little ones were up and dressed and had breakfast! I could get used to that, but alas, the big girls go home tomorrow. :(

Have a great weekend, and a good Friday the 13th! Happy Blogiversary to Me! :)

Mom Is Home! :)

Mom came home from the hospital today! I was surprised when MrKB told me she would be home, because we were told to expect her to spend at least two weeks in the hospital. Then again, we were told she'd be in ICU for at least 3 days, and she only spent 1 day there...guess Mom was determined to get out of there ASAP!

She is doing very well...much, MUCH more like the Mom we know and love...just now she's a bald Mom with about 37 staples in her head! LOL She's glad to be home, even though she's still in significant pain. She described going through this surgery as "going to hell and back", and is not sure she's going to go in for another surgery to get the rest of the tumors. I guess I can understand her being apprehensive about going through this again, but it's gotta be done! I have a feeling she will end up going, but only because the rest of the family is gonna make her go!

My two beautiful stepdaughters are here for a week! We told Mom and Dave that Patrick and Angelica were gonna HAVE to stay somewhere else for the week, since we'd have ALL FOUR of our girls here, and there's not enough room for six kids in our apartment. MrKB's Uncle has them at least for the week, thank goodness...cooking for six people is bad enough...I don't wanna cook for EIGHT! LOL

It's really nice having the girls here...they are 15 and 13, so we've got built-in babysitters for a week!!! LOL j/k....we don't expect them to spend all their time here babysitting their younger sisters. They did watch them for us for a few hours Saturday night so we could get away for awhile. They understood that we've just been crazy busy having our niece and nephew here for the last six weeks and we haven't had any time for ourselves. Today we just all hung out together at home and really enjoyed each other's company.

One thing we're definitely gonna do while the big girls are here is take them ALL to have their pictures done together. This is the first time we've had all four of our daughters together....before when my stepkids were here, it was always one or the other of them, not both. I can't wait to have a portrait of all my girls!! :)

Finally!!! I Can Report Some Good News!!!

First, a great big THANK YOU to all of you who kept Mom in your thoughts and prayers!! MrKB, me and our whole family appreciate it more than you could know.

The surgery went VERY well...the tumor they went in after today was about the size of a golf ball, and fortunately had NOT attached itself to any brain tissue whatsoever, which made the neurosurgeons' jobs much easier. Also, as far as can be told right now, it appears to be benign and not malignant as they originally thought. We won't know for certain until after it's been analyzed in the lab. I bet y'all can just imagine our relief!!

MrKB and I didn't get to see her after surgery...she spent a couple hours in recovery and we unfortunately had to leave to pick up her kids from school before she was transferred to ICU. We plan to go back up to the hospital in a few hours after we both get some much needed rest. I'll be sure to update you guys on her condition when I get back. Last we heard, she was still a bit sedated.

THANK YOU again for all the prayers, positive thoughts, and support! You guys ROCK! :)

*update* We didn't end up going back to the hospital to see Mom tonight. She is in a lot of pain right now, and her head is hurting her so badly she has requested complete silence in her room and is not up for a bunch of visitors. We will be going to see her tomorrow after MrKB gets home from work.

It's been a very long, emotionally exhausting day. The kids and MrKB are all in bed now, and I'm going to stay up just a bit longer and enjoy the quiet. :)

Brain Surgery Scheduled!! Please Pray!!!

Yeah...so we just got back a little bit ago from taking the kids up to the hospital to see Mom. Thankfully, she is basically the Mom we all know and love, thanks to getting some much needed necessary medication. She looked great and felt great! A whole 360 degree change from the state she was in Friday evening.

Anyway, we were all there when the neurosurgeon came in to talk to Mom. She will be having surgery on Wednesday morning at 7:30a.m. It is expected to take 4-6 hours. They will be trying to remove the largest tumor on her brain at this time, then she will be in ICU for maybe a week. Then comes about two months of recovery, and after that they will go in for a second surgery on the next tumor. The largest one is in the front of her head and is the one causing most of her problems right now so it is the one they want to address first.

I am so scared, y'all. I may come across as being strong, and maybe I am...but inside I am just a scared little girl who's falling to pieces! There was a guy the same age as I am (34) who just passed away after having brain surgery for cancer. He went into a coma and never came out of it. I am absolutely terrified of this happening to Mom!

Please, PLEASE...pray to whatever God, Goddess, or whoever you believe in, and if you can get anyone you know to pray for a perfect stranger, please do!! It means so much to us and our family...THANK YOU!

Okay...I think I'm gonna break down and cry....I don't feel very strong right now.

More Stuff on Mom...

Mom was taken to the hospital by ambulance on Friday...Aunt found her unresponsive so called them. She came around a little, and went through another CT scan and MRI. They showed little to no change in the tumors, but she had some fluid build up in her head. When asked by two different neurologists what year it was, both times she said "2007" and then "2009". She also thought Gore was the President. It was an emotionally exhausting day for us, as we spent most of it there at the E.R. waiting to hear some sort of news on Mom's condition.

She was admitted to the hospital again, and on Saturday was doing much better. It turned out she'd also been having mild seizures, and after being given 1000 mg of Dilantin, along with anti-nausea and pain meds she was a lot more herself. She at least on Friday recognized most of us who were there...all her brothers and sisters, their spouses, MrKB, me and her husband, and even my Daddy came up there. When she recognized MrKB and he went to give her a hug, they both started crying and just held each other for a long time. It took all I had not to break down myself...I'm fighting the tears now as I type this. I couldn't have asked for a better mother-in-law and I love her so much that sometimes it feels like it's my own Mom who's so sick!

Anyway, she is going to have surgery...we will find out today exactly when, and they are going to try and remove three of the tumors and relieve some of the pressure on her brain. One of them is in the occipital part of the brain, or on the occipital nerve...I can't remember...which would explain the problems she's been having with her vision. When she goes for this surgery, she will need the prayers and positive thoughts more than ever y'all. Brain surgery....damn....it scares me so much!!! I'm so scared she won't make it through, or she will but won't know any of us anymore or worse.

Her kids are still with us. We sat them down over the weekend and let them know just how sick she really is...we told them about the tumors, the surgery, everything. We didn't want to be the ones to tell them, but we felt it was time for them to know. We didn't want the worst to happen, and lose Mom without them having a clue, it would just make things worse. So now they know, and they know that there's the possibility she might not make it through the surgery itself, though we told them that's the case with any surgery. We told them to pray and send out positive thoughts, and that she has a lot of people thinking of her, praying for her, and that the angels are watching over her too. My niece cried some, but my nephew didn't...he asked a lot of questions, and you could practically see the wheels turning in his head as he processed all this information. He's got a way of trying to sort things out logically as he tries to make sense of things. I don't think it will really hit him until he actually sees Mom in the hospital himself. They are going to see her today sometime.

We were going to take all the kids to see her on Saturday, but some asshole slashed a tire on our vehicle, and the only spare we had was a tire that was already bad and separating. Oh, MrKB was PISSED, lemme tell ya! I was not happy either, of course. I mean, geez...what else is gonna be dumped on us?!? We don't have any extra money floating around for crap like this! We had to go to Wal-Mart anyway, and we checked tire prices while there...cheapest one was close to $51, and now we needed two. Mentioned it to my Mom yesterday on the phone, and even though my folks are pretty cash strapped right now theirselves, she insisted on getting the tires for us, because after all, her grandbabies ride around in that vehicle! At least she could put them on her credit card...all we use is cash, no credit cards here.

Long sigh....

I do have a bit of good news though! MrKB talked to his Dad yesterday, and he is doing pretty good right now. His doctors say his cancer is doing better...it's slowed down significantly, which is good. He said his legs are the only thing really bothering him right now, but that is from diabetes and not the cancer. He was in good spirits and he and MrKB talked on the phone for quite awhile. They usually don't talk more than a few minutes usually.

MrKB also talked to his daughters in Texas for awhile too. He told them what's been going on with Mom, so now they know also. He says my oldest stepdaughter sounded upset when he told her, but the youngest started crying on the phone. The good news is that they are fixing to be on their Fall Break from school next week. MrKB talked for a long time to his ex-wife also (which is just about unheard of! LOL) and told her what's been going on...she said she wondered about the smaller child support payments that she'd received, though she wasn't concerned. Well, SHE'S the one that mentioned the girls were going to be out of school, and said that we could come get them so they could spend the time with us here in Oklahoma! She said she wants them to get to see their Grandma too...which in itself was a shock...long story short, she's never wanted to allow them to see her before. MrKB's Mom has almost NO relationship whatsoever with them due to some falling out between her and their Mom when the girls were very little. At any rate, we will be traveling down to Texas to pick them up probably this next Saturday. :) We will have them for maybe a week, we're not sure yet.

Hey Monica!!! We could maybe meet up somewhere when we pick them up, or maybe when it's time to take them back home. Email me if you think you wanna... We could do lunch! :)

As for me, I'm still hanging in there...